Non-Stick Pans: Could They Be Toxic To You? | Talking Point | Full Episode

[Music] foreign [Music] I enjoy trying out new recipes and pay special attention to the ingredients I use [Music] but it was not until I received emails from a few talking point of viewers that I really thought about my tools several of you wanted to know about these non-stick pans and whether the material that coats it can be toxic so in this episode I'll find out what makes these pans work their magic and whether we should worry about it and the first few places I'm checking out regular kitchens hello Curry hi Diana so show me your kitchen this way [Music] the pants are here yes I take out okay no problem okay so my pants are in here okay wow [Music] let's take a look at this are all your pants non-stick yes they are all non-stick because more easier to maintain two out of three of your pants are non-stick why do you like non-stick pans I like non-stick plants because the washing pad makes it a lot easier I've tried washing a stainless steel pan before so you have to pour hot water in it you have to wait for it to disintegrate and then you have to use the steel wool to scrub and make sure it's gone and it's not a major nightmare I appreciate the convenience that the non-stick pans provide me I can use less oil and my food doesn't burn easily and the Very fact that you know if I were to fry an egg it'll slide off really nicely non-stick pans are clearly popular and one particular version dominates the market non-stick pans coated with honey Tetra Flora ethylene or PTFE for short you might know it better from its trade named Teflon [Music] Teflon in the time-honored way of most inventions was an accidental Discovery stemming from another kitchen appliance this in 1938 an American scientist was looking for a less toxic coolant for refrigerators during an experiment a chemical gas subjected to pressure and changes in temperature somehow produced Teflon [Music] when we look at how non-stick pans are made PTFE is applied to the metal surface of the pen the pen is then subjected to high temperatures and you get a non-stick pan but as with all products other chemicals are also added in the manufacturing process in the early 2000s a chemical used to manufacture Teflon was linked to cancer and other health issues the public outcry led to the chemical known by its acronym pfoa being phased out by most major manufacturers from 2014. when we go shopping for non-stick pans these days we're likely to come across claims such as this so pfoa free means it's safe right [Music] these chemicals are needed in making the pens so if you change one chemical you probably have to use a similar chemical to replace that I'm meeting associate professor Tong yenwa to unpack the science behind our non-stick pans is a sexual chemical used in the making of the non-stick pan itself it prevents the polymer from clumping together to form clusters allowing you to spray confined particles onto the surface of the pan and give you a smooth coating so if you have a soap bubble the pfoa will be the bubble itself and then the polymer will be inside in actual Factor very small almost a nanometer in size after 2014 they have replaced dfoa with a new generation called Gen X Gen X also acts like a soap bubble around the polymer so Gen X and kfoa actually belong to the same class of man-made chemicals called Forever chemicals so they perform the same job they belong to the same family of man-made chemicals my question is do they have the same risks unfortunately yes because Gen X and pfoa they have similar chemical structure so theoretically they would have the same health effects How likely will forever chemicals come off the pan and seep into my food the way that it happens is when you're cooking the food on your pan the heat will soften up the pan then the chemicals on top of it at around 250 degrees once that happens the forever chemicals will then go into the water or the food that you have so in normal cooking that would not happen because we normally cook at between 150 to 200 degrees but it could happen at a very small amount so the higher the temperature the more chemicals will reach out and you'll go into the food and go into our body after we eat it doesn't matter if my pan is scratched once you have a big deep scratch what happens is you create all these grooves into the pan then you have more contact with these forever chemicals so more contact Point means more of the release can happen into the food the higher the temperature of the pan the more at risk you are of having forever chemicals as part of your meal for most of us though it's unlikely we'll cook at such high temperatures [Music] but I'll soon learn that when it comes to Forever chemicals non-stick cookware does not even scratch the surface [Music] thank you ever admire the way your foundation gives your face a nice glow wondered why your burger doesn't stick to its wrapper always grateful for your babies stain resistant bit these are all items that have tested positive for per and polyfluoroical substances or pfas in recent years there are more widely known as forever chemicals because they take a long time if at all to break down in the environment foreign if a product can resist water and to grease it likely contains a forever chemical and this includes car windscreen treatments we love them for the non-stick stain resistant and waterproofing abilities but increasingly forever chemicals are linked to a host of health problems from liver damage to thyroid disease and even cancer process of making these consumer products is causing forever chemicals to leak into our environment they are emitted from factories into the air to fall as rain they also go into the sea and land and find their way into our food and water supply forever chemicals can travel very long distances far from the area where they were discharged researchers have even found them in remote areas such as rain water in Tibet and snow in Antarctica this pharmaceutical scientist is particularly interested in how our bodies process forever chemicals this chemical energy enter our body via two routes either orally when we ingest it or through our skin and get into our blood circulation but surely the risk for these two routes are not the same so in some countries the forever chemicals can be found in water drinking water so I would regard this as the highest risk contains forever chemicals your exposure risk is largest when you drink it then when you apply it for items such as food wrappers exposure is a two-step process chemicals have to leak off the wrapper into the food that you eat while for items you wear such as a raincoat it's a three-step process chemicals have to leak off the item come into contact with your skin and enter your skin where does the non-stick frying pan fall in this spectrum I think I'll put it somewhere in the middle where consumer really needs to pay attention on to how they use this pen once the surface is for example scratched or corroded they should really consider purchasing a new one how long do these forever chemicals stay in our system normally the liver and kidneys are very efficient in eliminating foreign compounds but in the case of forever chemicals they are not easily broken down in the liver and when they are being excreted by the kidney into the urine what happened is they get reabsorbed back into the blood circulation so what I'm hearing is that these forever chemicals are very resilient in our bloodstream what is the problem with them staying inside our bloodstream what we are concerned now is The Chronic exposure when the exposure is low but yet the chemicals in our body for such a long time the chemical now get accumulated gradually to a higher level Studies have shown that forever chemicals when they reach a minimum toxic level they can cause damages to organs in some cases it can lead to even cancer foreign researchers are still trying to figure out the impact of day-to-day low-level exposure of forever chemicals what's clear is that these chemicals do accumulate in our system over the years [Music] and one group should be taking special precaution [Music] sir Jerry Chan researches the various conditions that can affect a woman's ability to conceive well we did a study on Singaporean women who were attempting to get pregnant and we followed them through their pregnancy until a child is born what we've done is to measure some of the levels of forever chemicals in the bloodstream so the women with a higher level of fiber chemicals were 40 less likely to fall pregnant within a year and for 34 less likely to have a live birth at the end of the year women who had what the study considered higher levels of forever chemicals had two to three nanograms per milliliter in their blood a nanogrep is one billionth of a gram not visible to the naked eye that's not a very high level in our study compared to other countries it's just about a tenth of that compared to let's say the US the Norway or even China itself and yet we're able to determine a negative impact on fertility despite the low levels if someone is trying to get pregnant or is pregnant should she try to avoid using non-stick cookware amongst other things yeah that's a difficult question to answer directly one of the ways to reduce the risk could be the avoidance of such nons they could wear or even you know non-stick wrappers for your food I think women should really try to avoid potentially dangerous chemicals in your body for the chemicals it is an endemic problem and it's not going to go away and soon so it'll probably take the next few decades for us to understand the impact fully so we are now really studying the impacts on the children and the puberty the hormonal changes as they grow out older can manufacturers have sought to reassure consumers quoting other studies which say PTFE has no effects on health even when ingested but they have also put out advisories to not overheat food in the pans foreign forever chemicals can be found in almost everything and even a small amount has been linked to health issues so to reduce your exposure it's easiest to focus on eliminating two main categories grease proof food packaging and non-stick cookware when it comes to frying pans what are my other options ah the egg is getting to me oh my God [Music] thank you Dinah today we want to see how many perfect sunny side up eggs you can give us huh this is a stainless steel yep oh my gosh when it comes to regular frying pans stainless steel pans are highly durable and resistant to damage [Music] they were also easier to maintain compared to carbon steel and cast iron options oh my ego is already broken you would think that frying an egg is quite basic right not with a stainless steel pan [Music] the egg is getting to me oh my God what else can I not do if I cannot fry an egg I think adding more oil helps [Music] oh 10th week I'm not exactly proud of my fried eggs they don't look good but think that would tastes okay [Music] so I'm meeting someone who can give me tips on how to cook better with stainless steel [Music] hi Diana just in time this is for you okay why don't you grab a pen and we'll get started okay we're gonna sear some fish in these stainless steel pans very simple Pro tip we need to heat up the pan properly this is something that a lot of cooks make a mistake at home of doing and then you'll find that you know everything kind of gets mashed up and stuck to the pan right well the reason is because when the stainless steel is probably heated up the metal expands and it closes up all the little gaps because the metal is actually porous so once it closes up then the Flesh of the fish won't be able to go inside and get grabbed onto by the pan how high to heat the pan up to and for how long stoves will vary okay the way the test is I'm just gonna throw a bit of water in and you see it's like a ice skating rink so normally when the pan is not hot enough it will stay in one spot and bubble like a little puddle right but this you see how they skin across the pan [Music] oh I got it I got it so that's hot enough that is so cool so putting oil in the pan also adds another layer of non-stick properties to the pan wow look at that crust yeah okay I also have the crust if the presenting thing doesn't work out you can have a job here well if the restaurant doesn't work out you can come and be my Coho this is the first time that my cross actually looks this good [Music] so now what we're going to do is make a sauce saute some shallots some mushrooms and get some caramelization on them so they will actually stick to the pan but that's actually what we want when they stick to the pan they start to caramelize they start to turn brown and that's where all your flavor is going to come from and this is the benefit of a stainless steel pan over non-stick pans can I caramelize stuff in a non-stick pan it will caramelize but you're going to be here for four hours waiting for it to kind of like it'll take a long long time to get that nice uh brownie here you're gonna see it's gonna happen in like five minutes that's it I'm gonna go out and buy a stainless steel pan [Music] so how do you feel about stainless steel versus non-stick now I feel empowered like I could try this and maybe you can chisel as a non-stick to get a better culinary effect but then the question arises how on Earth am I gonna get all this out how can I clean it so this is the beauty of stainless steel unlike a non-stick pan Which they tell you don't damage don't scratch always use rubber tools you can just use a stainless steel sponge and just go at it and scrub it all out really really easy to clean [Music] okay I'm gonna rate your kitchen for your pants be careful these cast irons are pretty heavy huh [Music] out okay they are heavy do professional chefs use non-stick pans as well this is quite Niche I would use it for something like scrambled eggs what you have to know about non-stick pans in a heavy usage environment like the professional kitchen they're not going to last as long eventually the non-stick coating starts to wear off it'll get scratched even if you use a soft materials to to cook with so not so much in a professional kitchen and when it comes to alternatives to non-stick cookware this one is the stainless steel pan this is what we used before this is kind of like a great all-rounder yeah if you know how to preheat it properly this one this is uh the Workhorse of the professional kitchen it's a carbon steel pan this is a bit heavier than the stainless steel pan this is really great for all kinds of cooking I love to cook steaks on this but on like a stainless steel pan you can't really cook anything too acidic in this say if you're cooking a tomato sauce this will give it kind of a metallic taste so you want to use something like a stainless steel pan for that then over here we have a cast iron pan this is the ones that you know everybody kind of loves because they look pretty they're very traditional these are the ones that probably out of waffle require the most maintenance to season you'll hear people talk about seasoning your cast iron pan you need to rub it with salt put it in the oven develop that non-stick coating and then make sure you don't damage the non-stick coating so these are really wonderful to cook with but probably a little bit more time and Care is needed these days I hear a lot about people using ceramic coated non-stick pan what do you think of those ceramic coated pens on average and they last about a year good ones will last maybe three years or so so that's different from your traditional non-stick pan where if you look after this and you don't scratch it it can last indefinitely ceramic coated non-stick cookware are made with silica essentially sand and other inorganic chemicals they were perceived to be a safer non-stick cookware choice but they generally don't last as long compared to the common non-stick versions [Music] time to take stock of my frying pans since forever chemicals are everywhere I think it's a bit futile for me to try to give up my regular non-stick pan but what I've learned is that I should not heat them to over 250 degrees Celsius and always watch out for the scratches and I think I might toggle between a non-stick pan and a stainless steel one we can only mean one thing I have to brush up my culinary skills foreign [Music]

Channel: CNA Insider

Views: 236,311

Keywords: pfos, pfoa, ptfe, forever chemicals

Id: zh8FznO4scE

Length: 22min 59sec (1379 seconds)

Published: Mon Jun 19 2023